6. Though political pundits on television and radio inform the public, they also have to be concerned with

a. Entertainment value to increase their ratings.b. All of these.c. Making their audiences feel better about America.d. Being factually correct.

7. Social movements have been important sources of social, political, and economic change in the United States.

a. TRUEb. FALSE

8. A double standard exists on the part of advocacy organizations because issues facing advantaged subgroups get more attention than those facing disadvantaged subgroups.

a. TRUEb. FALSE

9. Contemporary political observers echo the two views of de Tocqueville and Madison in how they view the role of political groups.

a. FALSEb. TRUE

10. A national advocacy organization is an interest group

a. That only represents businesses.b. That informally represents broad groups of Americans who have similar interests.c. That represents all Americans whether they are powerful or not.d. That only represents minorities or people with less power in society.

11. The American people believe that justices on the US Supreme Court

a. None of these.b. Should be appointed for life.c. Should be elected and only for a 10-year term.d. Should be elected for life.

12. Regional, cultural, religious, occupational, and ethnic diversity all tend to increase the formation of political groups and social movements.

a. FALSEb. TRUE

13. In the United States, political parties are

a. Relatively rareb. Are a relatively accidental feature of the American historyc. None of thesed. Mentioned in the Constitution

14. Why are interest groups, political organiztions, and social movements so numerous in the US?

a. All of these.b. Because federalism and the separation of powers have created multiple points of access to political institutions.c. Because of the 1st Amendment, which protects speech. association, and the right to petition the government for redress of grievances.d. Because the way people are elected to Congress does not do a very good job of representing minorities, who have to find other ways of getting their needs met.

15. What is the margin of error for a sample of 1000 voters?

a. Plus or minus 3%.b. Plus or minus 1%c. Plus or minus 5%d. Plus or minus 2%

16. E.E. Schactschneider says about the interest groups that claim to work for poor people

a. That they may be making things worse for these people.b. That they do a good job even without handing out small benefits to attract people to their group.c. None of these.d. That they are able to accomplish a great deal even though the poor do not join those groups.

17. Why do the campaign staffs of presidential candidates pass up large states like California and Texas to concentrate on smaller states like New Mexico or Ohio?

a. The large states are just a few and there are more votes altogether in the small states.b. It is easier to persuade people in the small states.c. The large states are reliably red or blue, so the campaigns go after states where the vote is closer and they can take all of the votes even with a small win.d. The large states are just too expensive for campaigning.

18. Jackson notes that equality is generally defined as

a. Equality of process.b. Equality of opportunity.c. Equality of outcomes.d. Equality of results.

19. In an open primary, the voter can choose which primary election--Democratic or Republican--he or she would like to vote in.

a. TRUEb. FALSE

20. The womenâs movement can be very active on an issue such as affirmative action in higher education, which afffects their more affluent members, but overlook welfare reform, an important issue for their more disadvantaged or marginalized members.

a. TRUEb. FALSE

21. It is sometimes called "first-past-the-post" and sometimes "winner-take-all," but this kind of election means

a. No matter how many votes are cast and how many candidates the one with the most votes wins.b. None of these.c. The candidates have to have run-off elections until one wins two thirds of the votes.d. The top two candidates have to have a run off election.

22. Public opinion matters because in a democratic system we believe that government policy should follow the public will.

a. TRUEb. FALSE

23. With regard to ideology, Americans

a. Tend to identify with a party by their mid 20s.b. Tend to choose a political affiliation early in life.c. Tend to stay identified with a political party consistently the rest of their lives.d. All of these.

24. Alexis de Tocqueville

a. Found few religious associations in America.b. Wrote at the time of the American revolution in the 1780s.c. Wrote his great book Democracy in America at a time when Americans were forming many interest groups and associations in the 1830s.d. Was appalled at the number of commercial and manufacturing associations he found in America.

25. According to Strolovitch, in judging the effectiveness of an advocacy organization which claims to represent the marginalized,what are the guiding questions we should ask?

a. How active for the intersectionally marginalized are they? Because without that the organization is a failure.b. What coalitions do they form? Because coalitions are the key to success.c. What institutions do they target and what coalitions do they form? Because the political activity is the most important barometer.d. How active for the intersectionally marginalizedn are they, what institutions do they target, and what coalitions do they form?

26. How do the two dominant political parties prevent minor parties from emerging?

a. By using their vast funds and media resources to disparage minor party candidates.b. By refusing to give successful third party candidates leadership positions in the legislature.c. By poaching popular third party candidates before they begin to help their party.d. By manipulating election rules in debates and public funding to discriminate against the minor parties.

27. Since 1836, the republic has been dominated by how many political parties at a time?

a. Threeb. Fivec. Oned. Two

28. As sample size increases, the margin of error

a. Is greater than or equal to the margin of error.b. Stays the same.c. Decreases.d. Increases.

29. Affirmative advocacy

a. Looks for over-represented and under-represented issues in setting the agenda for activityb. Actively seeks out coalitions and works with others at the state and local levelc. All of thesed. Has a proactive agenda

30. The cell-phone only population is likely to include more young people, which pollsters have to take into account

a. TRUEb. FALSE

31. One method that schools use to politically socialize young people is

a. Ask students to watch TV news.b. Tell students who to vote for.c. Ask student to participate in mock elections.d. Ask students to read newspapers.

32. In addition to the legislative branch, advocacy groups target the executive and judicial branches.

a. TRUEb. FALSE

33. The problem with opt-in internet panels is that

a. Participants self-select, leaving out significant sections of the public.b. All of these.c. They have a greater margin of error.d. They do not use scientific methods.

34. An example of an organization which claims to represent a large demographic group is

a. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).b. All of these.c. The Japanese American Citizen's Leagues (JACL).d. The National Organization of Women (NOW).

35. Conservative and liberal ideologies differ mostly on

a. Campaign finance reform.b. Defense policy only.c. Economic and social issues.d. Civil rights.

36. Despite the fears of some that advocates for marginalized groups appeal to the courts too much, evidence shows that they in fact use the courts reluctantly and as a last resort.

a. FALSEb. TRUE

37. Are Americans more likely to vote in presidential elections than other types of elections?

a. No, Americans like to vote for direct democracy issues rather than indirect democracy representation.b. Yes, consistently American participate in presidential elections over other elections.c. Only in years when the presidential election is particularly interesting.d. No, because Americans are more interested in local issues.

38. The key way in which political parties enable democracy is

a. They stimulate interest among members of the mass publicb. All of thesec. They keep elected officials responsived. They allow a broader spectrum of participants to become involved in politics

39. In democracies around the world, multi-party systems are much more common and one sees small parties that advocate for one issue, one religion, or one demographic group.

a. TRUEb. FALSE

40. Poll results vary based on

a. Whether the method used was approved by the Census Bureau.b. Mean, median, and mode.c. Survey mode, sample size, and population definition.d. The statistical application of the Weights and Measures Bureauâs guidelines.

41. Voters who like a third party are nevertheless inclined to vote for a dominant party candidate for fear they will waste their votes.

a. FALSEb. TRUE

42. National organizations that file amicus curiae briefs are targeting

a. The Congress.b. The courts.c. The presidency.d. The Federal Reserve Bank.

43. Small racial, ethnic, or religious groups in the US

a. Don't have quotas for seats in the schools or government as they do in India.b. Do not have a party which is dedicated to their interests.c. Do not have legislative representation as is the cases in other countries with proportional representation.d. All of these.

44. When is the candidate's website NOT a good source of information?

a. To find more information about the candidate's biography.b. To find out more about the candidate's positions on the issues.c. To find an unbiased account of the candidate's voting history.d. To find out which prominent people and organizations support the candidate.

45. According to the "funnel of causality," party identification is more psychological than anything.

a. FALSEb. TRUE

46. The agencies which connect people to government are called "linkage mechanisms."

a. TRUEb. FALSE

47. Some theorists argue against the pluralists with a "rational actor" argument that says

a. That people are rational and want to maximize benefits and minimize effort, so they do not spend their time and resources to organize.b. That rational people always seek public goods.c. That it is rational to organize to acquire more public goods.d. That rational people really do not want the public goods as much as theorists think.

48. According to Jackson, the digital revolution has given us more information about the candidates,

a. And the candidates usually approve of the things written about them.b. And the information is usually quite accurate.c. But the information is not always accurate.d. But it is not very detailed.

49. Red states mean states that usually vote for the Democratic Party, while blue states mean those that are reliable for the Republican Party.

a. FALSEb. TRUE

50. According to Jackson, what is a core political value that nearly all Americans accept?

a. Equalityb. Democracyc. Libertyd. All of these

in this module (in my commentary) we read about the kwakiutl indians of the pacific northwest, and the custom in which a person who suffers serious loss may "lash back" at the hardship by inflicting pain on another party. in particular we looked at the case of a chief of a tribe who lost his sister and his niece in an accident. what do you think the right thing to do is in this case? stepin and police it?, or live and let live, as they say? defend your view. how does this pertain to the central topic of this module, ethics in international business? can you draw on case studies in our text that pertain to this subject? (remember, your essay you should have at least 600 words)

module 1:This module reading opens with a bizarre anecdote regarding Paul Ceglia, the guy who sued Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, for squeezing him out of the operation. Cegliaproduced a two-page contract as part of his owndefense but careful scrutiny revealed that he had added "page one" on his own, and then doctored it to make it look real by baking it in the sun (the clothes pins which he used to hang it left marks). This is a rather blunt instance of contract fraud, and not your everyday type of story, but it does set the tone for the subject of this module--the ethical requirements of contracts and the laws which advance and support those requirements.

To start, we might note that reading and understanding contracts, even relatively minor purchase contracts, can be an arduous process. Consider the catalog for NCA&T, or consider the standard college syllabus. These documents seem to grow more comprehensive and complicated every semester. On this head, the text quotes a summary remark from a 2009 contract dispute: "An insured should not have to consult a long line of case law or law review articles and treatises to determine the coverage he or she is purchasing under an insurance policy." And yet, this is often what happens with contracts, even for relatively basic purchases, like Dish on Demand package or an Internet service.

There are a range of interesting cases in this reading but I thought we could focus on two in this commentary which touch on everyday experiences. The first is car repair. Sears auto shops generate of a lot of income for the company, almost 10% of the 19 billion that it makes overall per year. In the 1990s a series of undercover operations revealed that Sears mechanics were overcharging in 90% of brake-repair cases by an average of $223 per customer. Closer inquiry revealed that Sears had a repair incentive program in place in which mechanics were offered promotions and pay raises if they generated sufficient repair revenue. Indeed in many instances, a mechanic's baseline salary was based on fulfilling such incentives. And if mechanics failed to keep their revenue up, according to the investigation, then they were often demoted or let go. Critics have argued that this policy almost forces employees to overcharge their customers. Even worse, said one critic, is that Sears was using its 100-year-old name (which supposedly is a name that inspires consumer trust) as a marketing tool. In response to the investigationsSears retracted its mechanic incentive program, fired a few top management people, and made a public apology, mixed with some remarks of innocence, of course. Profits for the company quickly dropped however, so much so, that there was pressure to reinstate the mechanic incentive program, which the company in fact did (partially) in 1994. I think to most of us it seems like a very basic and egregious conflict of interest to instate a program such as this, where workers at a company get rewarded for shafting customers in effect, and yet many businesses flirt with this sort of thing when they pay employees on commission. There are alternative models. If you have ever bought a car at Car Max then you know that there is no percentage-based commission. Sales people get a flat fee for every car they sell, whether it costs $10,000 or $50,000. (Incidentally, the flat commission is something like $150, which any car salesperson will tell you is not very much.) The company argues that this policy discourages the kind of scams and price-manipulation that so-often happens with car sales. Should this model be enforced as a matter of public policy? What about the old injunction, "buyer beware." Should the government be allowed to step in and police the payment structure for mechanics at Sears?

On a lighter note (I guess) is the account presented on page 362 which cites a New York Postinvestigation into the length of Subway's "foot-long" sandwich. Reporters for the paper discovered that some four out of seven sub sandwiches measure only eleven inches, or slightly less. Subway's response in its defense was that the "Footlong" is just a casual name for the item and not a testament to its exact length. Now, a bunch of disgruntled long-time Subway customers and a team of lawyers have filed a class-action lawsuit on grounds of "decepetive advertising." This may sound funny but it raises interesting questions about all kinds of claims made in advertising, which amount to a form of contract. I work in Rockingham County and every day I drive past a housing development called Oak Hills Estates. I look out my car window....no oaks, no hills, and no estates, at least not by any reasonable definition of that term. Or, another case, I also drive past a coffee shop which says it offers the "best coffee in the world." Now, I don't think anyone would have a problem with the coffee shop, right?, because the claim is obvious hyperbole. But what about the housing development and what about subway? Next time you see or hear an advertisement pay attention to this sort of thing. You will find that such claims are everywhere, and if so, does that lawsuit against Subway stand a chance? I mean that It seems that if we go after Subway and hold it to a certain exact standard then a lot of other advertisements would come under fire too, if we are going to be consistent. Hard to draw a line here, no?

module 2:We live in a global society, it is often said, and certainly the world of commerce has no borders, or fewer and fewer all the time. But when dealing in trade across various cultures, it seems we need a shared set of values or standards that apply to all actors. The text operates with the presumption that we can in fact forge such standards, and perhaps you do too. But there is a school of ethical theory which believes that no such standards exist, and this school, called moral relativism, may present a serious challenge to many of the points in our Module 6 reading, so I though it would be a good idea to revisit moral relativism in a little more detail here, at the very least to see what an international code of business practices would be up against, theoretically speaking.

When we briefly studied moral relativism in Module 1 (page 15) we looked at the premise that there is no one code of values that applies to all people in all places at all times. Relativism states that there are no moral codes that apply to all people, or that morality varies from culture to culture. The basic point is this: Morally speaking I come into the world a blank slate, and I receive concepts of virtue and vice based on what my particular culture believes. My attitudes on issues like marriage, showing respect, raising children, sexuality, etc. are shaped and defined by the fact that I live in 21st century America. If had I lived some place else, like India, or at some other time, like in ancient Greece, I might have very different views of right and wrong. Morality is relative to my cultural background; hence the name relativism. Moral relativism may be contrasted with Moral Objectivism, the view that there are some codes that apply to all people, no matter when or where they happen to live. Such codes are called absolute, or objective or universal.

So, moral relativism is the view that moral or ethical statements vary from culture to culture, and are thus all equally valid, so society's opinion of âright and wrongâ is really better than any other. The basic idea is that there is no ultimate standard of good or evil, so every judgment about right and wrong is purely a product of a culture's preferences. There is no ultimate standard of morality, according to moral relativism, and no statement or position can be considered absolutely âright or wrong,â âbest or worst.â Many arguments for relativism rest on the idea that different practices equal different morals. Consider this example, devised originally by the ancient Greek historian Herodotus: Culture A burns the dead. Culture B eats the dead. Therefore right/wrong in regard to dealing with the dead is relative to what your culture says. Or, you might come from culture C, which says that the dead ought to be buried. The point is that the relativist looks at these varying practices and concludes that there must be no objective universal standard that applies to all people. And of course we can compare cultures on other issues too, like drinking or abortion or marriage, etc. The world exhibits wide diversity when it comes to all of these customs. And the relativist concludes from such diversity that there are no codes that apply to all people (no objective codes).

In response to this, the moral objectivist might ask the following question: Does diverse behavior (on the surface) really entail diverse ethical codes? Perhaps these radically different practices are just various ways of expressing the same core moral value. Culture A burns the dead. Culture B eats the dead. But even though they express themselves differently, they share the same core moral value: Show respect for the dead. As you read, keep this argument in mind. Rachels discusses this point in section 2.5 of the chapter, entitled, Why There is Less Disagreement Than It Seems.

Moral objectivists have a number of reasons for claiming that relativism is weak and even incoherent: They say for one thing that it restricts us from judging the customs of other societies. Letâs look at a concrete illustration from a book called Patterns of Culture written in the 1930s by an Anthropologist named Ruth Benedict. Benedict describes a group of native Americans from the Pacific Northwest known as the Kwakiutl. They have a custom in which hardship or grief may be dealt with by lashing out at anyone, even if that person had nothing to do with the hardship. Benedict writes,

Among the Kwakiutl it did not matter whether a relative had died in bed of disease, or by the hand of an enemy, in either case death was an affront to be wiped out by the death of another person. The fact that one had been caused to mourn was proof that one had been put upon. A chiefâs sister and her daughter had gone up to Victoria, and either because they drank bad whiskey or because their boat capsized they never came back. The chief called together his warriors, âNow I ask you, tribes, who shall wail? Shall I do it or shall another?â The spokesman answered, of course, âNot you, Chief. Let some other of the tribes.â Immediately they set up the war pole to announce their intention of wiping out the injury, and gathered a war party. They set out, and found seven men and two children asleep and killed them. âThen they felt good when they arrived at Sebaa in the evening.â

What is going on here? A man loses his sister and his niece so he randomly kills nine people who had nothing to do with it to make himself feel better. Now, if you did something nasty to me I might seek some sort of punishment for you in order to make myself feel better. That is called retributive justice, we see it in many places, most notably perhaps in the Bible (an eye for an eye), and it makes sense to a lot of people. But the Kwakiutl have something completely different going on. Itâs not like you do something nasty to me and I seek justice against you. Itâs like, you do something nasty to me and I punch the person sitting next to you. Should the Kwakiutl be allowed to practice this custom? Should someone step in and police their behavior? If you are an ethical relativist, your answer to that last question would certainly be no, for all the reasons described above.

Maybe some of you would call yourselves relativists in this particular case. Hey, itâs their culture and who am I to step in and police them, you might say. I wouldnât want them coming to Greensboro, NC and telling me what I can or cannot do, so why do I have any right to do that to them. Live and let live. But if we take this principle and apply it consistently, we may run into some very disagreeable conclusions. Forget the Kwakiutl for a moment and replace the nine innocent deaths with six million Jews. Strictly speaking, the relativist would have no grounds for saying âstopâ to Hitler than she would for saying stop to the Kwakiutl. And that position, to many, including Rachels, is deeply problematic.

Along with this critique of relativism I want to presents an argument in support of moral objectivism, the view that there are some codes that apply to all people, and the view which seems to be the basic operating position in our text. Imagine a culture in which there is no value placed on telling the truth. Letâs think that through. Imagine that this commentary that Iâve written is a complete crock, and you are going to get an F on the exam because I have been lying to you about relativism. You canât complain to my supervisors because our culture places no value on truth telling and that means I am allowed to lie to you. So, you take your F and leave campus and stop for lunch at a restaurant. You ask your server if the pasta has gluten in it because you canât eat gluten. He says it doesnât even though heâs not sure because heâs too lazy to check and he knows he wonât get in trouble because lying is permissible. So now youâve got and F and youâre in the hospital with a severe allergic reaction to your lunch. The person standing over your bed likes the idea of being a doctor even though she never went to medical school. She has lied her way into the position, with no retribution of course, and now you are being treated by someone with no credentials and you wind up dead. The end. You can see how quickly something like a disregard for truth-telling could ruin your day. the moral objectivist's point is that it is impossible to imagine such a culture. Having some regard for honesty is an objective code, he says; it is universal.

Despite this sort of defect it is important to present some positive aspects of the relativistâs outlook. Defenders say that relativism guards against the danger of assuming that our preferences are based on some absolute standard, and that is what helps us check that disdain or repugnance we might feel for those whose practices differ from our own, so we donât just assume the Callatians, or the Ancient Greeks, or the people down the street, are morally repulsive. Thus, though the theory seems to have many faults, it does offer some genuine insightâ¦it encourages tolerance and discourages arbitrary prejudice.

This commentary has strayed a bit from the immediate reading in the text, but I thought (given the very brief attention we paid to relativism in Module 1) that it would be a good idea to give more careful consideration to what the international business community is up against when it attempts to forge standards that would apply to all participants worldwide. Global trade is not going away. Isolation is bad economic policy (look at North Korea). Thus it seems the only way forward is to devise some standards of trade that apply to all of us. In conclusion, I'd like to draw attention to various cross-cultural iterations of the golden rule, listed on page 389. When we look at something like this, it seems that a unified point of view may not be so far-fetched. The question is whether the sort of consensus presented on page 389 can translate into commerce. Is that plausible?

maroonhorse371